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Friday, December 30, 2011

CAN WE CELEBRATE CHRISTMAS?

The Church Of Nativity

The Star of Bethlehem. Here, the Word became flesh. The exact place of Jesus’ birth.

"Don’t celebrate Christmas. It has a pagan background!" Iglesia Ni Cristo, Dating Daan, Jehova’s Witnesses and Seventh Day Adventists are not ready to celebrate Christmas with the whole world as they believe the birthday of Jesus is not written in the Bible and some practices related to this celebration, has its pagan background! In order to realize the foolishness of their stand we have to analyze some facts (historical and biblical, common sense and reason) related to the celebration of Christmas on 25th December.

As we all know, the birth of Jesus is written in the Bible; not its day and date. We celebrate Christmas on 25th of December not because that particular ‘date’ is important, but the event that we remember on that date, which divided the history into two, is very essential for our salvation. The Bible doesn’t say the exact date of Christ’s birth as December 25, and even the calendar that we use today was not in existence at that time! Just like any other feasts in the Catholic Church, (Good Friday, Easter Sunday, etc…) we commemorate biblical events in different days of the liturgical calendar, not because that ‘dates and days’ have something to do with our salvation, but those events that we commemorate, are essential mysteries for our salvation.

The Biblical Basis Of Christmas Celebrations

At the time of Jesus, birthday celebrations were very common as it was a practice among the Jews. The birthday of Pharaoh (Gen. 40:20-22), birthday of Herod (Mk. 6:21-28), birthday of Job (Job 1:4, 18-19) are narrated in the Bible. There is no evidence in the Bible that Jesus prohibited birthday celebrations as anti-Catholics insist now!

The birth of Jesus was celebrated by shepherds and angels, in heaven and on earth, the Bible describes. We have to know from our common sense that, just because the date is not seen in the Bible, we can’t celebrate the anniversary of Christ’s birth! Even Protestants, who are addicted to ‘Bible Alone Theory’ of Luther, are also celebrating Christmas!

Jesus celebrated annual holy days and feasts that are not commended in the Old Testament but observed as a simple custom of that time. (Passover, Pentecost, etc… were commended. But the celebrations narrated in Judges 11:39-40, Esther 9:19&22 and the Feast of Dedication that Jesus himself observes in John 10:22-23 are not commended by the Scripture. (It was instituted by Judas Maccabeus and celebrated by the Jews, only as a custom!)

Christmas And Pagan Traditions

Anti-Catholics make a big issue about some Christmas practices that has similarity with pagan customs (Christmas trees, candles, December 25, exchanging of gifts, etc…)

But all Christian practices that are written in the Bible, also have the same problem! They already existed in the pagan world, in different forms and styles! For example, baptism by immersion in water, for the forgiveness of sins, has existed as an old custom of ancient Hindu religion. They believed, immersion in the river Ganges, purifies them from all sins! Does that mean, baptism is pagan?

The pagans bowed their knees and prayed to their gods; so the Christian should not bow and pray? Even the word ‘Bible’ was widely used in the pagan world, as ‘the books’ that are written about Greek gods; then we should not use the word ‘Bible’? The church construction of Iglesia Ni Cristo is a blind imitation of Catholic cathedrals of Gothic art in Europe; does that mean, INC church is a Catholic Church? Those elements which have similarities of pagan culture, that crept in to Christmas celebrations, will never make Christmas, a pagan celebration. (The real word meaning of ‘Christmas’ is Christ and Holy Mass; without that Christmas becomes meaningless.)

The Date ‘December 25’

The early Christians selected December 25th as the proper date of Christmas, maybe because, according to some Bible scholars, there were biblical evidences to conclude, December 25th was the exact date of our Lord’s birth.

St. Luke who wrote the Gospel in ‘orderly sequence’ (Lk. 1:1-4) most probably got the date of the Lord’s birth from Mother Mary. Scripture says Zechariah received the message from an angel while he was incensing; which shows the Feast of the Dedication of the Temple on September 18-24, according to the Roman calendar. After six months Mary received annunciation from the angel (Lk. 1:26-38), that is the month of March. (Traditionally, the Church celebrates it on March 25th). We have to add just 9 months from this date to know the date of Christ’s birth, which justifies the centuries old custom of Christmas on December 25.

The second reason, why early Christians celebrated Christmas on 25th of December was, to attract pagans to Christianity. For pagans December 25th was the birthday of sun god. Christians proudly proclaimed to them that the real sun, is Jesus, the ‘sun of righteousness’ (Mal.4:2) and slowly replaced the pagan feast into a meaningful celebration, and attracted pagans to the true faith, in obedience to the Bible: “Overcome evil by good” (Rom. 12:21). Thus Christmas became a celebration of the victory of Jesus over pagan gods! (Ref.: Dictionary of Roman Religion, Oxford University press, New York, 1996)

Now, all over the world, nations and religions, Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists, remember the great birth of Jesus in that day. (Only Iglesia Ni Cristo, Ang Dating Daan and other fake churches, try their best to remind others those ‘forgotten gods of history’; sun god, Mitra and other devils, on this Holy Day for their vested interests, just hoping to get some followers!)

A tree is known by its fruit. The right tree only bears the right fruit as the mango tree bears only mangoes. Anyone who claims to teach the truth and yet such teachings does not comes from the tree of truth - the pillar and foundation of truth (1Tim3:15), teaches only lies just as an apple fruit no matter how sweet it is, will never be a fruit from a mango tree and are like the false prophets' sweet words of lies and deceptions.